The Blade Itself

by Joe Abercrombie

  ‘What?’

  ‘No, no! My master would be horrified if he knew. Horrified! Give up fencing and you give up more than that! This is how one comes to the notice of the public, you see? They decide, in the end. There’s no nobility without the commoners, no nobility at all! They decide!’

  ‘What?’ Jezal glanced around the park, hoping to catch sight of a guard so he could notify him that a dangerous madman was loose in the Agriont.

  ‘No, you mustn’t give it up! I won’t hear of it! No indeed! I’m sure that you’ll stick with it after all! You must!’

  Jezal shook Sulfur’s hand off his shoulder. ‘Who are you?’

  ‘Sulfur, Yoru Sulfur, at your service. See you again, Captain, at the Contest, if not before!’ And he waved over his shoulder as he strolled off.

  Jezal stared after him, mouth slightly open. ‘Damn it!’ he shouted, throwing his steels down on the grass. Everyone seemed to want to take a hand in his business today, even crazy strangers in the park.

  As soon as he thought it was late enough, Jezal went to call on Major West. You could always be sure of a sympathetic ear with him, and Jezal was hoping that he might be able to manipulate his friend into breaking the bad news to Lord Marshal Varuz. That was a scene that he wanted no part of, if he could possibly avoid it. He knocked on the door and waited, he knocked again. The door opened.

  ‘Captain Luthar! What an almost unbearable honour!’

  ‘Ardee,’ muttered Jezal, somewhat surprised to find her here, ‘it’s good to see you again.’ For once he actually meant it. She was interesting, is what she was. It was a new and refreshing thing for him to actually be interested in what a woman had to say. And she was damn good-looking too, there was no denying it, and seemed prettier every time he saw her. Nothing could ever happen between them, of course, what with West being his friend and all, but there was no harm in looking, was there? ‘Er . . . is your brother around?’

  She threw herself carelessly down onto the settle against the wall, one leg stretched out, looking very sour. ‘He’s out. Gone out. Always busy. Much too busy for me.’ There was a definite flush to her cheek. Jezal’s eye lighted on the decanter. The stopper was out and the wine was halfway down.

  ‘Are you drunk?’

  ‘Somewhat,’ she squinted at a half-full wine glass at her elbow, ‘but mostly I’m just bored.’

  ‘It’s not even ten.’

  ‘Can’t I be bored before ten?’

  ‘You know what I mean.’

  ‘Leave the moralising to my brother. It suits him better. And have a drink.’ She waved her hand at the bottle. ‘You look like you need one.’

  Well, that was true enough. He poured himself a glass and sat down in a chair facing Ardee, while she regarded him with heavy-lidded eyes. She took her own glass from the table. There was a thick book lying next to it, face down.

  ‘How’s the book?’ asked Jezal.

  ‘The Fall of the Master Maker, in three volumes. They say it’s one of the great classics of history. Lot of boring rubbish,’ she snorted derisively. ‘Full of wise Magi, stern knights with mighty swords and ladies with mightier bosoms. Magic, violence and romance, in equal measure. Utter shit.’ She slapped the book off the table and it tumbled onto the carpet, pages flapping.

  ‘There must be something you can find to keep busy?’

  ‘Really? What would you suggest?’

  ‘My cousins do a lot of embroidery.’

  ‘Fuck yourself.’

  ‘Hmm,’ said Jezal, smiling. The swearing no longer seemed half so offensive as it had done when they first met. ‘What did you do at home, in Angland?’

  ‘Oh, home,’ her head dropped against the back of the settle. ‘I thought I was bored there. I could hardly wait to come here to the bright centre of things. Now I can hardly wait to go back. Marry some farmer. Have a dozen brats. At least I’d get some conversation that way.’ She closed her eyes and sighed. ‘But Collem won’t let me. He feels responsible, now that our father’s dead. Thinks it’s too dangerous. He’d rather I didn’t get slaughtered by the Northmen, but that’s about where his sense of responsibility ends. It certainly doesn’t extend to spending ten minutes together with me. So it looks like I’m stuck here, with all you arrogant snobs.’

  Jezal shifted uncomfortably in his seat. ‘He seems to manage.’

  ‘Oh yes,’ snorted Ardee, ‘Collem West, he’s a damn fine fellow! Won a Contest don’t you know? First through the breach at Ulrioch, wasn’t he? No breeding at all, never be one of us, but a damn fine fellow, for a commoner! Shame about that upstart sister of his though, too clever by half. And they say she drinks,’ she whispered. ‘Doesn’t know her place. Total disgrace. Best just to ignore her.’ She sighed again. ‘Yes, the sooner I go home, the happier everyone will be.’

  ‘I won’t be happier.’ Damn, did he say that out loud?

  Ardee laughed, none too pleasantly. ‘Well, it’s enormously noble of you to say so. Why aren’t you fencing anyway?’

  ‘Marshal Varuz was busy today.’ He paused for a moment. ‘In fact, I had your friend Sand dan Glokta as fencing master this morning.’

  ‘Really? What did he have to say for himself?’

  ‘Various things. He called me a fool.’

  ‘Imagine that.’

  Jezal frowned. ‘Yes, well. I’m as bored with fencing as you are with that book. That was what I wanted to talk to your brother about. I’m thinking of giving it up.’

  She burst out laughing. Snorting, gurgling peals of it. Her whole body was shaking. Wine sloshed out of her glass and splattered across the floor. ‘What’s so funny?’ he demanded.

  ‘It’s just,’ she wiped a tear from her eye, ‘I had a bet with Collem. He was sure you’d stick at it. And now I’m ten marks richer.’

  ‘I’m not sure that I like being the subject of your bet,’ said Jezal sharply.

  ‘I’m not sure I give a damn.’

  ‘This is serious.’

  ‘No it isn’t!’ she snapped. ‘For my brother it was serious, he had to do it! No one even notices you if you don’t have a “dan” in your name, and who’d know better than me? You’re the only person who’s given me the time of day since I got here, and then only because Collem made you. I’ve precious little money and no blood at all, and that makes me less than nothing to the likes of you. The men ignore me and the women cut me dead. I’ve got nothing here, nothing and no one, and you think you’ve got the hard life? Please! I might take up fencing,’ she said bitterly. ‘Ask the Lord Marshal if he has space for a pupil, would you? At least then I’d have someone to talk to!’

  Jezal blinked. That wasn’t interesting. That was rude. ‘Hold on, you’ve no idea what it’s like to—’

  ‘Oh stop whinging! How old are you? Five? Why don’t you go back to sucking on your mother’s tit, infant?’

  He could hardly believe what he was hearing. How dare she? ‘My mother’s dead,’ he said. Hah. That should make her feel guilty, squeeze an apology out of her. It didn’t.

  ‘Dead? Lucky her, at least she doesn’t have to listen to your damn whining! You spoiled little rich boys are all the same. You get everything you could possibly want, then throw a tantrum because you have to pick it up yourself! You’re pathetic! You make me fucking sick!’

  Jezal goggled. His face was burning, stinging, as if he’d been slapped. He’d rather have been slapped. He had never been spoken to like that in his life. Never! It was worse than Glokta. Much worse, and far more unexpected. He realised his mouth was hanging half open. He snapped it shut, grinding his teeth together, slapped his glass down on the table, and got up to leave. He was turning to the door when it suddenly opened, leaving him and Major West staring at each other.

  ‘Jezal,’ said West, looking at first simply surprised and then, as he glanced over at his sister, sprawling on the settle, slightly suspicious. ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘Er . . . I came to see you actually.’

  ‘Oh yes?
’

  ‘Yes. But it can wait. I’ve things to do.’ And Jezal pushed past his friend and out into the corridor.

  ‘What was all that about?’ He heard West saying as he strode away from the room. ‘Are you drunk?’

  With every step Jezal’s fury mounted until he was halfway to being strangled by it. He had been the victim of an assault! A savage and undeserved attack! He stopped in the corridor, trembling with rage, his breath snorting in his nose like he’d run ten miles, his fists clenched painfully tight. And from a woman too! A woman! And a bloody commoner! How dare she? He had wasted time on her, and laughed at her jokes, and found her attractive! She should have been honoured to be noticed!

  ‘That fucking bitch!’ he snarled to himself. He had half a mind to go back and say it to her face, but it was too late. He stared around for something to hit. How to pay her back? How? Then it came to him.

  Prove her wrong.

  That would do it. Prove her wrong, and that crippled bastard Glokta too. He’d show them how hard he could work. He’d show them he was no fool, no liar, no spoiled child. The more he thought about it, the more it made sense. He’d win this damn Contest, is what he’d do! That’d wipe the smiles off their faces! He set off briskly down the corridor, with a strange new feeling building in his chest.

  A sense of purpose. That was what it was. Perhaps it wasn’t too late for a run.

  How Dogs are Trained

  Practical Frost stood by the wall, utterly motionless, utterly silent, barely visible in the deep shadows, a part of the building. The albino hadn’t moved an inch in an hour or more, hadn’t shifted his feet, hadn’t blinked, hadn’t breathed that Glokta had noticed, his eyes fixed on the street before them.

  Glokta himself cursed, shifted uncomfortably, winced, scratched his face, sucked at his empty gums. What’s keeping them? A few minutes more and I might fall asleep, drop into that stinking canal and drown. How very apt that would be. He watched the oily, smelly water below him flap and ripple. Body found floating by the docks, bloated by seawater and far, far beyond recognition . . .

  Frost touched his arm in the darkness, pointed down the street with a big white finger. Three men were moving slowly toward them, walking with the slightly bow-legged stance of men who spend a lot of time aboard ship, keeping their balance on a swaying deck. So that’s one half of our little party. Better late than never. The three sailors came halfway across the bridge over the canal then stopped and waited, no more than twenty strides away. Glokta could hear the tone of their conversation: brash, confident, common accents. He shuffled slightly further into the shadows clinging to the building.

  Now footsteps came from the opposite direction, hurried footsteps. Two more men appeared, walking quickly down the street. One, a very tall, thin fellow in an expensive-looking fur coat was glancing suspiciously around him. That must be Gofred Hornlach, senior Mercer. Our man. His companion had a sword at his hip, and was struggling with a big wooden trunk over one shoulder. Servant, or bodyguard, or both. He is of no interest. Glokta felt the hairs on the back of his neck prickling as they neared the bridge. Hornlach exchanged a few quick words with one of the sailors, a man with a big brown beard.

  ‘Ready?’ he whispered to Frost. The Practical nodded.

  ‘Hold!’ shouted Glokta at the top of his voice, ‘in the name of his Majesty!’ Hornlach’s servant spun round, dropping the trunk onto the bridge with a bang, hand moving toward his sword. There was a soft twang from the shadows on the other side of the road. The servant looked surprised, gave a snort, then toppled onto his face. Practical Frost strode swiftly out of the shadows, feet padding on the road.

  Hornlach stared down, wide-eyed, at the corpse of his bodyguard, then across at the hulking albino. He turned to the sailors. ‘Help me!’ he cried. ‘Stop him!’

  Their leader smiled back. ‘I don’t think so.’ His two companions moved without hurry to block the bridge. The Mercer stumbled away, took a faltering step toward the shadows by the canal on the other side. Severard appeared from a doorway before him, flatbow rested across his shoulder. Replace the bow with a bunch of flowers and he’d look as if he was on his way to a wedding. You’d never think that he just killed a man.

  Surrounded, Hornlach could only look around dumbly, eyes wide with fear and surprise, as the two Practicals approached, Glokta limping up behind them. ‘But I paid you!’ Hornlach shouted desperately at the sailors.

  ‘You paid me for a berth,’ said their Captain. ‘Loyalty is extra.’

  Practical Frost’s big white hand slapped down on the merchant’s shoulder, forced him onto his knees. Severard strolled over to the bodyguard, wedged the dirty toe of his boot under the body and rolled it over. The corpse stared up at the night sky, eyes glassy, the feathers of the flatbow bolt sticking out from his neck. The blood round his mouth looked black in the moonlight.

  ‘Dead,’ grunted Severard, most unnecessarily.

  ‘A bolt through the neck will do that,’ said Glokta. ‘Clean him up, would you?’

  ‘Right you are.’ Severard grabbed the bodyguard’s feet and hauled them over the parapet of the bridge, then he took him under the armpits and heaved the body straight over the side with a grunt. So smooth, so clean, so practised. You can tell he’s done it before. There was a splash as the corpse hit the slimy water below. Frost had Hornlach’s hands tied firmly behind him now, and the bag on. The prisoner squawked through the canvas as he was dragged to his feet. Glokta himself shuffled over to the three sailors, his legs numb after all that time spent standing still in the alley.

  ‘And here we are,’ he said, pulling a heavy purse from his inside coat pocket. He held it swinging just above the Captain’s waiting palm. ‘Tell me, what happened tonight?’

  The old sailor smiled, weathered face crinkling up like boot leather. ‘My cargo was spoiling and we had to be away on the first tide, I told him that. We waited and waited, half the night down by that stinking canal, but would you believe it? The bastard never showed.’

  ‘Very good. That’s the story I’d tell in Westport, if anyone should ask.’

  The Captain looked hurt. ‘That’s how it happened, Inquisitor. What other story could there be?’

  Glokta let the purse drop and the money jingled inside. ‘With the compliments of his Majesty.’

  The Captain weighed the purse in his hand. ‘Always pleased to do his Majesty a favour!’ And he and his two companions turned, all yellow smiles, and made off toward the quay.

  ‘Right then,’ said Glokta, ‘let’s get on with it.’

  ‘Where are my clothes?’ shouted Hornlach, wriggling in his chair.

  ‘I do apologise for that. I know it’s quite uncomfortable, but clothes can hide things. Leave a man his clothes and you leave him pride, and dignity, and all kinds of things it’s better not to have in here. I never question a prisoner with their clothes on. Do you remember Salem Rews?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Salem Rews. One of your people. A Mercer. We caught him dodging the King’s taxes. He made a confession, named a few people. I wanted to talk to them, but they all died.’

  The merchant’s eyes flickered left and right. Thinking about his options, trying to guess what we might know. ‘People die all the time.’

  Glokta stared at the painted corpse of Juvens behind his prisoner, bleeding bright red paint all over the wall. People die all the time. ‘Of course, but not quite so violently. I have a notion that someone wanted them dead, that someone ordered them dead. I have a notion it was you.’

  ‘You’ve got no proof! No proof! You won’t get away with this!’

  ‘Proof means nothing, Hornlach, but I’ll indulge you. Rews survived. He’s just down the hall, as it goes, no friends left, blubbering away, naming every Mercer he can think of, or that we can think of, for that matter.’ Narrowed eyes, but no reply. ‘We used him to catch Carpi.’

  ‘Carpi?’ asked the merchant, trying to look nonchalant.

  ‘Surely you remember
your assassin? Slightly flabby Styrian? Acne scars? Swears a lot? We have him too. He told us the whole story. How you hired him, how much you paid him, what you asked him to do. The whole story.’ Glokta smiled. ‘He has an excellent memory, for a killer, very detailed.’

  The fear was showing now, just a trace of it, but Hornlach rallied well. ‘This is an affront to my Guild!’ he shouted, with as much authority as he could muster, naked and tied to a chair. ‘My master, Coster dan Kault, will never allow this, and he’s a close friend of Superior Kalyne!’

  ‘Shit on Kalyne, he’s finished. Besides, Kault thinks you’re tucked up safe aboard that ship, bound for Westport and far beyond our reach. I don’t think you’ll be missed for several weeks.’ The merchant’s face had gone slack. ‘A great deal could happen in that time . . . a very great deal.’

  Hornlach’s tongue darted over his lips. He glanced furtively up at Frost and Severard, leaned slightly forward. So. Now comes the bargaining. ‘Inquisitor,’ he said in a wheedling tone, ‘if I’ve learned one thing from life, it’s that every man wants something. Every man has his price, yes? And we have deep pockets. You have only to name it. Only name it! What do you want?’

  ‘What do I want?’ asked Glokta, leaning in to a more conspiratorial distance.

  ‘Yes. What’s this all about? What do you want?’ Hornlach was smiling now, a coy, clever little smile. How quaint, but you won’t buy your way out of this.

  ‘I want my teeth back.’

  The merchant’s smile began to fade.

  ‘I want my leg back.’

  Hornlach swallowed.

  ‘I want my life back.’

  The prisoner had turned very pale.

  ‘No? Then perhaps I’ll settle for your head on a stick. You’ve nothing else I want, no matter how deep your pockets are.’ Hornlach was trembling slightly now. No more bluster? No more deals? Then we can begin. Glokta picked up the paper in front of him, and read the first question. ‘What is your name?’